Flower export ban bad news for HB grower

JOE DAWSON
It could be a grim Christmas for Hawke's Bay flower growers Trevor and Rosemary Rendle.
The New Zealand flower industry has been struck a devastating blow as one of the country's most important export markets shuts its doors on all New Zealand flower products.
As at midnight the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) suspended all shipments of flowers and foliage to the US due to an interception of the Light Brown Apple Moth on New Zealand flowers, a pest Californian counties have spent millions of dollars trying to eradicate.
For New Zealand growers of paeonies and orchids the news was bleak.
Spokesman for the New Zealand Flower Exporters Association Greg Keymer, who is also managing director of flower exporting company Eastern and Global Ltd, said with the orchid season at its peak and the paeony season poised to begin, growers were looking at tough times ahead.
"The trade with States is 30 per cent of export trade in cut flowers," he said. "It's 30 per cent of value, but 70 per cent of importance."
The US market had been resilient despite the recession and had "underpinned the whole export industry for the last five to eight years".
"In the short term it's a major setback.
"The US is the biggest market for New Zealand paeonies and it starts in four to six weeks.
"You can't just dump anything that would go to the US on other markets."
He said major work would need to be done before the US would consider opening its doors again.
Crops grown outdoors will need to be involved in the establishment of a significant risk management programme, which would require funding and take months to achieve a level acceptable to the USDA.
He said there was a "glimmer of hope" for those who grow indoors, who will be allowed to export once facilities have been inspected by an independent verification agency.
He said hundreds of properties nationwide would need to be inspected and a national register established - a mammoth task.
Tikokino commercial paeony grower Trevor Rendle, of Trenrose Paeonies, said the company was two weeks away from exporting and looking at having product they can't sell.
"What it sounds like is we're not going to be able to send to the States," he said.
"There's the Asian market but that's tiny - 90 per cent goes to the States, and that's going to make a huge dent.
"I don't know what we're going to do with the flowers."
He said he had a good crop of 6000 plants, which will yield 60,000 blooms.
The local market would not be able to absorb that volume.
"We're pretty devastated, we don't know what's going to happen. We make all our income in two months. This is our only business and the tragedy is we still have to do all the maintenance."
Mr Keymer said it was understood the Light Brown Apple Moth was found on helleboros and forsythia flowers grown outside in the South Island.